Humans Natural/Optimal Habitat

[JeuneKoq]

Also TylerDurden you seem to be quite fit and healthy, but imagine how it would be for weaker individuals, such as newborns and elders. It would be a lot more difficult for them to survive the cold, at least without any clothes or heated shelter.

[nummi]

Cold acting as a cooling for the brain would rather be one side of the whole, not the entire truth.

[RogueFarmer]

Does being smaller really make you more suited to the cold? I would think it would be the other way around, since being large means you have less relative surface area and a larger, more efficient, more powerful and warmer reactor. I think being of smaller stature is more an adaptation for living in very harsh circumstances and times of food scarcity. Also, developing children might get less food during food scarcity and thus develop smaller.

I'm almost a giant and more cold impervious than anyone I know other than my father who is also near giant size. I just made it through February without lighting a fire once in my house. My only source of heat is my body, half ass winter clothes, my sleeping bag and a couple cats.

[JeuneKoq]

Does being smaller really make you more suited to the cold? I would think it would be the other way around, since being large means you have less relative surface area and a larger, more efficient, more powerful and warmer reactor.

Hmmm it really depends. For example bigger man-selected plants are not more nutrient-rich than smaller, "original" plants. Modern wheat grains may be bigger in size than small spelt, but that's just because they contain a lot more gluten than the latter. Smaller things are generally just more concentrated, in nutrients for example, than their larger equivalent. Take a small breed of pepper and a bigger breed and you'll notice that for most it's just the quantity of water inside them that varies, not their spiciness.
Therefor smaller people will probably have a heating reactor just as powerful as taller people, but they'll have less bodily surface to heat, thus using less energy to keep warm.
(Take note that I have no intention of being critical towards tall people. Sometimes being tall truly is a survival advantage)

[Iguana]

The shape with the best surface area to volume ratio to keep heat is the sphere. 

[TylerDurden]

Obviously Orientals are only better adapted to the cold, but not as much as in palaeo times. Fur is not needed if the body has much warmer blood circulating, with extra layers of fat around the belly and so on.

The Neanderthals were  even better adapted to the cold than Homo Sapiens, so certainly never needed any fur. There was some scientific stuff about the shape of their noses etc. which explained partly why they were so much better adapted:-

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12203812

[RogueFarmer]

Larger people have less surface area to body mass, not more. Larger means more efficiency in consumption but less in getting around to feed.

[JeuneKoq]

Larger people have less surface area to body mass, not more.

Yes that's true. I forgot while writing my post that the "insides" also needed to be heated, and not just the layer of skin(surface). But that still means that 1) Smaller individuals have less body mass that needs heating and 2) they need less calories to maintain a correct body temperature.
At least that's what I believe to be the reason why they are more resistant to cold. Maybe TylerDurden can answer this in a more detailed/better way.

Obviously Orientals are only better adapted to the cold, but not as much as in palaeo times. Fur is not needed if the body has much warmer blood circulating, with extra layers of fat around the belly and so on.

The Neanderthals were even better adapted to the cold than Homo Sapiens, so certainly never needed any fur. There was some scientific stuff about the shape of their noses etc. which explained partly why they were so much better adapted:-

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12203812

The study you posted states nowhere that Neanderthals really did not wear clothes. It actually claims, as I did, that Neanderthals could not have a thick enough layer of fat, unlike some aquatic mammals such as seals, to protect themselves efficiently against cold. If, as a terrestrial mammal, they did have a thick enough layer of fat, then they would actually be "obese". And if they where obese they would certainly have trouble foraging food and hunting down animals.

Yes they acquired noses that where more adapted to cold climates, as well as blue eyes and straight hair, but that's probably because they would not protect their face with clothing. I usually don't wear anything on my head, even during wintertime. I doubt they would, be it a mammoth skin balaclava. Since this part of their body was in constant contact with the surrounding environment, it may be one of the only things, along with light skin, that partly "adapted" to cold climates.

Having warm blood circulating in your body doesn't have such a great influence on your levels of resistance against colder climates. Every mammal has warm blood flowing inside them. They still need fur or fat to keep warm. Unless that animal originates from a region or zone where -heavy- protection against cold is quite unnecessary. Furless animals come in that category, with animals such as Egyptian cats, elephants, hippos and…humans.
Talking about pachyderms, why do you think mammoths had fur, but not their Southern cousin the elephant?

Finally, we both agree that Neanderthals had a bigger brain than Sapiens. Don’t you think they would be smart enough to find a way to store the most energy they could by, for example, keeping their bodily heat from otherwise dissipating into the surrounding air by wearing handcrafted clothes made out of animal skin? Sapiens certainly was bright enough to do so.
Who knows, maybe that’s why Neanderthal disappeared  . To dumb to wear clothes when it's cold outside.

[JeuneKoq]

By the way TylerDurden could you post a link to a study that actually states that Neanderthals did not greatly depend on animal flesh as a food source? Their downfall as a subspecies of Homo would make more sens in that case, them not being able to fulfil their daily 4000+ kcal intake, out of meat for the most part. It could be that their habitat's environment changed in a way that made the population of animals they previously hunted on become rare; Or it could be that they were not fit, not capable enough to compete with Sapiens on the hunting scene, at a time where both would be found occupying the same regions.

[TylerDurden]

By the way TylerDurden could you post a link to a study that actually states that Neanderthals did not greatly depend on animal flesh as a food source? Their downfall as a subspecies of Homo would make more sens in that case, them not being able to fulfil their daily 4000+ kcal intake, out of meat for the most part. It could be that their habitat's environment changed in a way that made the population of animals they previously hunted on become rare; Or it could be that they were not fit, not capable enough to compete with Sapiens on the hunting scene, at a time where both would be found occupying the same regions.

All nonsense. Neanderthals needed a lot of plant foods:-

[van]

I don't know about Europe, but here in the us,  Indians did quite well with adequate amounts of animal food, with some plant supplementation.

[JeuneKoq]

All nonsense. Neanderthals needed a lot of plant foods:-

Tyler, I was actually asking you if you had any info on this, since you seem to know what you are talking about. From what I've learned, Neanderthals relied mostly on meat. But maybe it's not the case, so if you know of some info that states otherwise, please post it here. Of course aside from that I do believe that Neanderthal ate some plants, but maybe in a small proportion, or at least not as a principal source of energy, making him less apt to survive if animal flesh became somehow scarce. But maybe this is wrong...

[AnopsStudier]

so do you guys think there is a certain location most optimal to people?

[TylerDurden]

Here is that study:-

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/04/080428-neanderthals-diet.html

I seem to be becoming more careless and not bothering to actually add links I point to.

[eveheart]

so do you guys think there is a certain location most optimal to people?

This question of yours forms a common theme for many of your posts, and much intelligent speculation has followed, yet your question still lingers...

Perhaps you won't get one, overriding, definitive answer, yet you will find interesting evidence and pseudo-evidence on both sides. Perhaps, instead of answering your question, you can understand the various perspectives involved, such as the absence of insulating body hair and subcutaneous body fat in humans where no adapted animal could live without either vs. the fact that mankind does revel in the cold. I'm sure you've come across posts on this forum - the video of children playing in the snow in their bathing suits and pouring chilled water over their whole bodies comes to mind, as do videos of "The Iceman" Wim Hof and pictures of our member Inger's icy dips - that stretch the limits of what we think of "necessary" temperatures for human survival.

I've lived in 40 below and 40 above, and both were tolerable. I used the Zen saying, "When you're hot, be perfectly hot, and when you're cold, be perfectly cold" to mentally adapt to both extremes.

Another way to look at it: if you look at non-human primate distribution maps, you find the natural, optimal areas for those species to live. Now, look at human distribution maps. Those are the areas where we have adapted, either physically or mentally.

You might enjoy the movie Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner, a tale in the arctic. For me, it shattered the image of arctic peoples wrapped in furs and huddling in igloos.

Good luck in your studies.

[JeuneKoq]

Thanks for the study Tyler, it quite fits the view I had which is that Neanderthals, even though they held animal flesh as a central piece of their diet, still ate a certain amount of plant food. Too bad experts did not yet uncover the average proportion of plant (roots, fruits, berries, leafs) eaten perhaps on a regular basis by those guys.
Also I think it could be interesting to discuss in another thread the circumstances that led Homo Neanderthal to go extinct.

[panacea]

@TylerDurden

You are right that humans are much better adapted to cold when they are truly healthy (not just muscular or athletic). Some of the healthiest people in the world, true tibetan monks, can withstand such cold temperatures overnight with minimal clothing that it left scientists baffled.

The reasons this is possible is because:
Extreme health allows ideal CO2 levels, which dilates blood vessels and helps circulation
They have adapted their bodies to the cold over time via brown fat - a special kind of "warmer" fat that generates heat like muscle and is developed by subjecting bare skin to cold temperatures
They can relatively effortlessly raise their body temperature, through faster metabolism, in response to their environment, as many healthy animals do

However, due to our lack of fur, we have a remarkable ability to rapidly cool ourselves by sweating. Unfortunately, as soon as there is any rain+cold weather+wind, we will die soon when naked in freezing weather no matter how healthy you are. That is why animals like us either stay where it is warm, and only in rare cases do we need to take shelter in things like mud or water for rainstorms. (bodies of water for protection against wind chill)

[TylerDurden]

Putting oneself into water would only make things worse by enhancing exposure. Water is a very effective coolant.

Look, this nonsense re needing fur to ward off the cold and that we are all supposedly only adapted to warm climates  must stop. It is ridiculous when one considers all the various humans who have easily adapted to the cold. I am thinking of examples such as martial artists practising in snow with bare feet, russian children being  regularly doused with ice-cold water in Siberia because it makes their bodies hardier and them less prone to infection and so on and so forth.

Come to think of it, even animals that have fur routinely seek out  warm dens in which to sleep or hibernate  so that they can handle the cold climate as a whole. No reason why humans can't similiarly seek out shelter during storms and still survive in a cold climate.

[JeuneKoq]

Putting oneself into water would only make things worse by enhancing exposure. Water is a very effective coolant.

Look, this nonsense re needing fur to ward off the cold and that we are all supposedly only adapted to warm climates  must stop. It is ridiculous when one considers all the various humans who have easily adapted to the cold. I am thinking of examples such as martial artists practising in snow with bare feet, russian children being  regularly doused with ice-cold water in Siberia because it makes their bodies hardier and them less prone to infection and so on and so forth.

Come to think of it, even animals that have fur routinely seek out  warm dens in which to sleep or hibernate  so that they can handle the cold climate as a whole. No reason why humans can't similiarly seek out shelter during storms and still survive in a cold climate.

Tyler, with these kind of examples you give, it seems you believe that because we can stand cold temperatures for a limited amount of time, we can survive a whole freezing winter naked. Yes our Paleolithic ancestors were more resistant to cold, they had to because even Equatorial Africa has chilly nights in winter, and frisky river or sea water to swim/bath into.

When I went to Senegal (West Africa) during winter vacation, I was surprised to see the people working in this outside hotel resort wearing windbrakers, gloves and winter caps at night. It wasn't as cold as back in Belgium, but cold enough for them to dress that way. It only got warm enough for us to leave our sweatshirts after breakfast, around 10-11am.

Paleo humans could probably manage a couple of bitter nights without the need for extra protection, but they certainly could not survive a whole season in freezing temperatures, bare. Believing humans are better than animals who do have suited protection for these kind of northern climates is ridiculous. You are right, Humans aren't the bunch of lousy wimps some believe them to be. But they're not super-beings either. They simply are...humans

[TylerDurden]

As I have already pointed out ad nauseam,  modern humans have ALREADY shown themselves to adapt to much colder environments for long periods of time, without the ridiculous need for  extra fur or clothes etc.. Palaeo humans had better genes than us due to  enduring  natural selection and so undoubtedly were even more cold-resistant than modern humans.

Plus, as I have already pointed out numerous times, the out of africa theory is a bogus myth. Hominids like the Neanderthals lived far outside Africa in extremely cold environments without any fur and did so   up to 2,000,000 years ago.

[AnopsStudier]

So what is it about the blue zones then?   Areas in the world where people live the longest and healthiest..
What do they all have in common?


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Zone

    Okinawa, Japan
    Sardinia, Italy
    Loma Linda, California
    Nicoya, Costa Rica
    Ikaria, Greece



They are all coastal towns.   With spectacular ocean and land views. 

[Iguana]

...and not particularly cold places! 

[JeuneKoq]

As I have already pointed out ad nauseam,  modern humans have ALREADY shown themselves to adapt to much colder environments for long periods of time, without the ridiculous need for  extra fur or clothes etc..

Hmmm not really. You have shown that modern humans can stand short periods of time in really cold environments naked, and maybe longer periods of time in total immobility, as some buddhist monks can. But maybe your idea of a long or a short period of time is not the same as mine.

Palaeo humans had better genes than us due to  enduring  natural selection and so undoubtedly were even more cold-resistant than modern humans.

Yes, that is clear, even to me.

Plus, as I have already pointed out numerous times, the out of africa theory is a bogus myth. Hominids like the Neanderthals lived far outside Africa in extremely cold environments without any fur and did so   up to 2,000,000 years ago.

As long as you don't have actual proof of this (Neanderthals not wearing fur in Northern regions), it is nothing else than speculation. The study you posted never claimed this either.
Also I never recognized the Out of Africa theory as being valid. I just explained that humans can manage warm tropical and equatorial climates with their possible colder nights while being totally naked, all year round; But they may not survive whole snowy winters without some kind of protection (clothing, for starters).
I guess in the end there is no point discussing this, as one chooses to believe what one chooses to believe.

AnopsStudier, what the people living in the blue zones generally have in common is a healthy, frugal diet (raw fish for the Okinawans), a stressless yet active lifestyle, and presence in a rather pristine environment (the coast as you mentioned).

[TylerDurden]

...and not particularly cold places! 

  Iceland is well-known for its citizens' longevity and is pretty cold.

[TylerDurden]

Hmmm not really. You have shown that modern humans can stand short periods of time in really cold environments naked, and maybe longer periods of time in total immobility, as some buddhist monks can. But maybe your idea of a long or a short period of time is not the same as mine..As long as you don't have actual proof of this (Neanderthals not wearing fur in Northern regions), it is nothing else than speculation. The study you posted never claimed this either.
Also I never recognized the Out of Africa theory as being valid. I just explained that humans can manage warm tropical and equatorial climates with their possible colder nights while being totally naked, all year round; But they may not survive whole snowy winters without some kind of protection (clothing, for starters).
I guess in the end there is no point discussing this, as one chooses to believe what one chooses to believe.

  No, I meant longer periods of time. After all,  wild animals all have different methods of handling the cold, not just  by having fur. Some have blubber, some have enhanced blood vessels near the skin, others have  evolved unusual physical shapes which are better adapted to the cold, and so on.

I think it is reasonable to assume that Neanderthals never wore fur. For one thing, the notion of fur-wearing cavemen only ever got started with Hollywood films like that 10,000,000 BC film starring Raquel Welch. I somehow doubt that cavewomen wore furs purely designed to cover  breasts and private parts. The Neolithic era was the era in which humans got started developing the tools of civilisation, so, clothes would likely only have been invented then. Hmm, tell you what I will ask a palaeo expert re this. This guy is an unashamed out of africa theorist but he should be able to answer non-related questions with more integrity.